23
BELOW THE PRIEST’S HAND
Corayne
Corayne had heard stories of Adira from nearly every member of her mother’s crew, her mother included. The card tables, the concubines and brothels, the night markets hawking goods from all over the Ward, stolen or otherwise. Real dragon scales, ancient and crusty, in the curio shops. Spindletouched mages brewing up tonics and poison outside taverns. Thieves’ gangs and pirate crews outfitting their companies. The crown of Treccoras, the last Cor emperor, had been won in a game of dice in the House of Luck and Fortune, then immediately lost to the marshes. But the history was there too; she’d heard it mostly from Kastio. When moved to talk, he spoke of distant years, centuries long since passed, as if he were reciting from the pages of a university tome, or had an impossibly long memory.
It had been Piradorant once, truly the Adoring Port, beneath the ancient empire. The small city and surrounding territory had sworn allegiance to Old Cor long before her armies arrived. There was no conquest. She was a willing bride, and the Cors treated her as such. Her walls were gilded, her streets wealthy. She blossomed, a flower basking in the light of a doting sun. But the empire fell, night came, and the world moved on in its shadow. The stumbling kingdom of Larsia grew and eventually chafed with the might of neighboring Galland. The Larsians fought to defend their border from encroachment. The city now called Adira filled the cracks between.
Wedged between warring kingdoms, often cut off by battle or blockade, Adira survived through less than honorable means. Pirate ships regularly ran Gallish blockades to feed the hungry city. Cutthroats and rogues slipped around entrenched armies. Within the walls, the city rotted like an apple. The King of Larsia did not have the strength to wrest it back from the criminals who controlled it, and Galland would not bother. The Gallish kings cared for glittering capitals and vast expanses of rich land. Not a fortress slum on a marshy peninsula, its streets bristling with rusty knives and gutter rats. Adira adapted to the world as it was, becoming what it needed to be.
The peninsula had a gray-green look as they approached from the north, a spit of land shoved out into the Bay alongside the mouth of the Orsal. The river flowed through marshland, belching silt into the bluer salt water. Adira sat at the peninsula’s head, the city walled in by a crown of mossy stone and wooden palisade. A stone causeway zigzagged over the marshes, through the worst of the mud, with no less than six drawbridges, all of them pulled up. It was a Cor-built wonder, like the roads, aqueducts, and amphitheaters within the old borders. There would be no assaulting Adira from land, not by any army upon the Ward.
As they rode onto the causeway, Corayne caught sight of the docks before the mist closed it. The sails of a dozen ships crowded the harbor like needles in a pincushion. Pirates and smugglers all. Not a single flag of a lawful kingdom. Corayne smiled as she had in Lecorra, drawn to this place, rooted in it somehow. But this time it wasn’t the Spindletouched echoes of Cortael she felt. This was the land of her mother, of Hell Mel.
Andry balanced her obvious excitement with naked fear. His eyes locked on the first drawbridge, drawn up against the sky like a flat hand ready to fall and crush them all. The squire of a noble court had no place here. He already stuck out like a sore thumb, even next to Dom. And that was a very high mark to clear.
“Hey, no worries,” Corayne murmured to him, drawing her horse in close. She bent, the sword digging into her back. “Half the stories aren’t even true. No one’s going to boil your face off and sell your skull.”
The reins cracked in his fists. His eyes widened. “I never heard that one before.”
The first drawbridge fell without so much as a word from any of them, not even a bribe from Dom or a threat from Sorasa. On the other side, two bridge wardens stood, toothless and gray-faced, silent as they rode on. Corayne thought a bit of face boiling might improve their appearance.
“Draw your hoods,” Sorasa said, pulling her cowl into place. She arranged the shawl around her shoulders so the daggers in her belt and the sword at her side would be easy to wield.
Dom did the same, stone-faced, sweeping the green cloak of Iona back from his left hip. He seemed a bit lighter these days. The road must agree with him, Corayne thought. The mist closed in, nearly obscuring Valtik as she plodded along at the rear. On her gray horse in her gray clothes, she was a shadow as much as the bridge wardens, a ghost of the marsh. Even her lurid eyes were veiled, gone to gray like the rest of the world.
Corayne felt like a horse blinkered. There was only the causeway and the muffling silence of the mist. The land around Adira existed in some eerie in-between, part of no kingdom, separated by a narrow barrier of mud.
At the second bridge, the wardens had bows ready, arrows quivered at their hips. Corayne suspected there were more hiding in the wetlands.
“You lost?” one asked, his voice lisping over his broken teeth. His cheeks were pockmarked.
“Not yet,” Sorasa answered.
The bridge fell.
Such was the way at every turn: wardens shouted challenges and Sorasa answered. Corayne couldn’t tell if it was a code or not. She memorized the responses all the same. You lost? Not yet. What’s your business? Same as yours. Who do you know in the city? Too many to name. Are you going to make trouble? Most likely. In truth, it was probably the combination of a tattooed Amhara and a hulking mountain of a man with a sword to match his glowering face that opened the bridges. The rest of them were inconsequential. Even Valtik kept her mouth shut, following in off-putting silence.
The final bridge dropped without a challenge, connecting the causeway to the city hill. The mist lifted while they climbed, and the world came back into sharper focus. A shantytown bunched around the gate and walls, loosely organized, as the city spilled out of its own boundaries. It had the look of a slum but none of the despair.
Adira was bigger up close, hunched on the rise, thrust out of the haze, with clear sight in all directions: over the marsh and the foggy causeway, over the flat waters of Mirror Bay. The border was not far but felt a thousand miles away. Taristan and Erida cannot touch us here. As the smell and sounds of the city intensified, Corayne felt something like an embrace. She sucked down a breath of fresh salt air, raising her face to the sun. This was one of the most dangerous corners of the Ward. And the safest place we can be.
“All those bridges, and they leave the gates open,” Andry said, eyeing the city wall.
Indeed, the gates were flung wide, flanked only by a pair of wardens. They leaned on old spears, more for show than for function. Corayne smirked. “I suppose after six bridges, the marsh, and whoever else watched our approach, they have no reason to keep the gates shut all day long.”
The wardens were dressed in leather and rough-spun cloth. Like the bridge guardians, they wore no uniform or color to unite them in their work. They watched, silent but sharp.
Sorasa said nothing to either of them, urging her horse onward. She only pulled down her cowl, exposing her face as she rode first through the gate. Maybe it was a trick of the shifting light, but Corayne thought she saw the assassin’s shoulders droop, releasing some tension. A criminal haven was a lullaby to a contracted killer.
Andry retreated into his hood, showing only the hard set of his jaw. Despite his unease, he seemed less a squire and more a traveler, weary but unafraid. Still, his fingers twisted on the reins. Corayne was struck by the very odd impulse to grab his hand. She blinked, startled, and pushed it away. Warmth flushed in her face, and she willed her cheeks not to turn red.
The wall wasn’t thick, barely as wide as three men abreast. Corayne passed through quickly. She couldn’t help but notice murder holes pocking the ceiling. Her skin crawled at the thought of a man pouring hot oil down on her.
“At least it doesn’t smell as awful as Ascal,” Dom grumbled as he cleared the gate, one hand resting on his sword. Valtik followed close behind.
The square inside the gate was oddly quiet, but then it was still daylig
ht. Corayne assumed that most of Adira’s residents would be sleeping off the night before, and the ones who weren’t were well past noticing a few more riders on the streets.
Sorasa nudged her horse east, past a headless statue, its hands raised in supplication. Someone had draped their laundry from its fingers.
“I didn’t know there could be so many places to drink,” Andry whispered to Corayne, leaning close as they passed a stretch of taverns, each one more cramped than the last. Unlike Dom and Sorasa, he was still unarmed. The best he had was the kettle, still thunking softly in his saddlebags.
“Want to peel off?” she replied. The square became a spiderweb of streets, quieter than the gate. An old man weakly advertised games of chance from a balcony while a woman squawked at him to stop talking. “I doubt Sorasa would mind.”
He laughed, meeting her stare. Up close, his eyes were dark stones flecked with amber.
“I think Dom and Sorasa would rather tie us up and drag us than let us explore,” he said, jabbing a thumb over his shoulder. The Elder rode close behind, his glare leveled on Corayne’s back. I might as well be tied up already. “Not that I want to.”
“Oh, come on, Squire Trelland.” Corayne smiled and leaned further, one hand gripping the pommel of her saddle for balance. She cut a glance at the street. It felt like a vein, thrumming with life she couldn’t see. Two men stumbled out of a dice house, trying to fight and missing every blow. They reminded her so much of the Tempestborn crew her heart ached. “Aren’t you curious?”
Andry watched the pair. “I’ve seen drunks before, thank you.”
A pair of knights a bit tipsy on the Queen’s vintage are not drunks, Corayne thought.
“There’s more to do here than drink,” she replied.
Andry nodded. “And I hope we get it over with quickly.”
“Maybe not too quickly,” Corayne shot back. He glanced at her, an eyebrow raised in question. She bit her lip, chewing the moment. “It’s nice to see you worry about something that isn’t the end of the world,” she finally said, almost too softly for mortal ears.
Beneath his hood, Andry smiled, his face brightening.
“Likewise, Corayne.”
“The laws of Adira are simple.” Sorasa’s voice was as gentle as a whipcrack, snapping over them both. She turned in the saddle, directing her horse with only her knees and the grip of her leather- sheathed thighs. “There are none,” she concluded, matter-of-fact.
Corayne got the sense her warning was mostly for Dom, who barely understood a proper mortal city, let alone one run and ruled by outlaws. And for Andry, who gaped at their surroundings.
“Kill a man in the street if you like, but know you can be killed just as easily. Cut a purse and be prepared for a cut in return. There are no guards, no city watch. Only the wardens on the bridges, walls, and gates. And their objective isn’t to protect you; it’s to protect Adira.” Sorasa waved her fingers, gesturing back the way they’d come. Like she said, there were no more wardens to be seen, a stark contrast to every other city Corayne had passed through. “Nothing and no one else. Anything can be taken, from every direction. Keep your eyes up. Don’t lose sight of me.” Then she reached, tugging on the bridle of Corayne’s horse, so that the mare huffed and drew in close. Sorasa met Corayne’s eyes with a stare to bore through steel. “Don’t wander off.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Corayne answered like a child accused. I can’t exactly explore with the Spindleblade between my shoulders, balancing the salvation of the Ward with its impending doom.
“Good,” Sorasa cut back. “And before you start in on your questions, we’re headed to the Priest’s Hand.”
Andry blanched. “There are priests here?”
Sorasa grinned. “Not the kind you’re used to, Squire.”
The Priest’s Hand was a church, or had been sometime in the last two centuries. Now it was a marketplace, the pews long since removed to make room for stalls. Smoke wafted overhead, trapped by the domed roof of a former shrine to Tiber, the god of trade and craftsmen. His face was painted on the walls, wearing his usual crown of coins. Corayne knew him well.
There was little order to the place. The smell of muddy soup wafted from a cook stand, while a Tyri sailor with gold teeth displayed a cage of beady-eyed ravens. A man sold animal bones next to twin sisters praying over glittering lengths of jewels and beads. There were cloth merchants, fishmongers, fruit vendors, and stalls with no obvious purpose but to sell bits of junk. Stolen goods, Corayne knew, eyeing the displays as they passed. She saw her charts again, weaving the lines of trade through the Long Sea. She smirked at the telltale oily sheen of Treckish steel at a workman’s table, though Trec kept a tight fist on their mines and craftsmen. She wanted to linger, but Sorasa drew them through the church as if they were all tied together. Only Valtik halted. Naturally, she went to a spread of ribs, spines, and femurs, pawing through them with a slack grin. She even tested a few, tossing them between her hands and over the ground like a gambler playing at dice.
Perhaps that was the idea. So far, my fate seems like a bad turn of luck.
Dom kept close at her back. For once, he wasn’t so out of place. While the streets were quiet, the Priest’s Hand was busy, and many Adirans were as large as Domacridhan. Bruisers, bandits, pit fighters, sailors with sun-damaged cheeks. Lean thieves and beautiful courtesans from all over the Ward wove among them. A man with diamond-pale, glowing skin even winked at Dom, blowing him a kiss with a beckoning hand.
Corayne stopped searching stalls and began searching faces, hoping to spot whoever Sorasa intended to recruit to their quest. She nearly halted before an Ibalet man, his look similar to Sorasa’s, with a belt of daggers and eyes like a falcon. But Sorasa passed him by without a second glance. Soon the long walk through the church was finished, and they stood before the abandoned altar. Instead of a droning priest reciting godly scripture, a pair of dogs lounged around it, panting with slobbering smiles.
“Are they here? Have we missed them?” Corayne said, looking back down the church. A few eyes trailed them, watching carefully. The two most obvious were a pair of men in long gray robes, their boots new leather. They had the look of a religious order, even if there was no religion under this roof. “We’re being followed,” Corayne said flatly.
“I’m being followed,” Sorasa replied with a sigh. She even waved a hand in their direction. “They’re nothing. The Twilight Brothers are a joke.”
Andry’s jaw dropped. He looked from Sorasa to the robed men, not bothering to drop his voice. “The Twilight Brothers? They’re killers, assassins—”
“And what am I? A milkmaid?” Sorasa smirked, once at Andry and then at the Brothers. They sneered, turning tail with a dramatic spin of their robes. Steel flashed beneath, their swords naked with no sheaths. “Like I said, a joke. They’re waiting to get me alone, make me an offer again. All so I can refuse again.”
Sorasa declined to elaborate.
Dom cared more for the stone tiles beneath them, flat and worn, making up the raised the dais of the altar. He scuffed a boot over them.
“There’s more beneath us,” he said sharply.
“Nothing gets past you, Elder,” Sorasa said, waving them all past the chipped altar. The dogs panted in their wake, watching with baleful eyes. Andry stooped to give one a scratch.
He caught Corayne watching and shrugged. “A criminal dog is still a dog.”
A narrow stair hid behind the altar, cramped between the dais and the exterior wall. Another image of Tiber, his mouth spilling coins, loomed over the stairway. Sorasa gave him a familiar pat on the nose as she descended the steps. Corayne did the same, hoping for a blessing.
A square chamber, once a crypt, opened up below. Three of the walls had long rectangular openings, vaults for coffins. They were blissfully empty. Corayne swallowed, put off by the vaults, but at least no skeletons leered in the dim light.
On the only flat wall, a single torch burned, off center against the
brick and mortar. When it flickered, Corayne could make out something like a doorway, nearly blending into the wall, visible only at the edges where it couldn’t lie completely flush.
But Sorasa didn’t go to the door. Instead she reached into one of the vaults, never hesitating, and rapped her knuckles on the back wall inside. It sounded like wood. After a hasty second, it slid back, and a pair of eyes appeared where a body once rotted.
“Five—” Sorasa said to the eyes, then stopped herself and checked their number. Valtik was still upstairs. “Four. The witch is mingling.”
“You know the rules: no more than two,” came a raspy reply. The eyes darted. They were green and watery, surrounded by fat, pink flesh.
Sorasa bent closer. “Since when have rules meant anything around here?”
Before the eyes could answer, another voice sounded behind the sliding panel.
“Is that Sarn I hear?” a male voice said.
The eyes rolled. Before Sorasa could say another word, the panel snapped back into place, slamming shut.
Dom rumbled out a low laugh. “You have that effect on most people.”
There was a grinding, a gear turning somewhere in the wall as a pair of latches pinged open. Corayne jumped when the door in the brick wall swung forward, heavy on great iron hinges. The chamber beyond was long, well lit by torches and streams of daylight.
Sorasa smiled in the Elder’s face, or as close as she could reach. “I certainly do,” she said, passing into the next room with a bounce in her step.
The original crypt extended the length of the church above, set with fat, cobwebbed columns and high, flat windows to bring in at least some natural light. It shifted, blue and white with the passing clouds. There were more vaults along the walls, all stuffed with crates, tools, and food stores, as well as miles of parchment and gallons of many-colored inks.
Corayne looked it over, noting wood blocks that looked suspiciously like printing stamps, not to mention several cast-iron molds. Her eyes narrowed.
We’re in a forger’s workshop.
Realm Breaker Page 31